RAOUL DUFY (LE HAVRE, 1877 – FORCALQUIER, 1953) Horse-drawn Carriage at Falaise 1905 Oil on canvas 78 x 64 cm. Signed lower left Certificate by Fanny Guillon-Lagaille Weaving its way between the gaunt silhouettes of the trees, a carriage glides along a path carved out of the snow. Were it not for the red circles of its wheels, one would scarcely notice its presence, so much does its black body blend in with the houses in the background and its white horse merge with the snow. Here, it is the trees that seem to be the subject of the painting. Their slender trunks, rooted in the snow, streak across the entire surface of the canvas. Far from being motionless, they seem to dance with their bare branches standing out against a grey sky. Their arrangement is rhythmic. Two thicker trunks frame the scene, echoing one another on either side of the path. On the right, the tree closest to us extends beyond the frame, occupying the full height of the painting and inviting us to step inside. Through this framework, we can make out a passer-by, a black shadow hurrying along, overtaken by the carriage, then, further in the background, a few hovels and, finally, a wall. This wall introduces a horizontal break into this ascending composition. The line marking its top seems to be an almost parallel echo of that of the path. This coloured plane brings together the full range of colours found in the painting. Above its summit rise other trees, suggested this time by simple coloured streaks. The colours in this work emerge as one delves deeper into it. Depth creates colour. The brushwork, always highly graphic, moves away from the dark tones of the foreground to become fauvist-style hatching in the distance, where yellow ochres vie with Sienna earths and greens. It is also the trees that vary from one trunk to another—here greenish, there grey-blue, then over there violet or rust-coloured… Dufy, at the height of his Fauvist period, demonstrates his talent as a colourist in this warm, variegated palette so characteristic of the movement which he would, however, soon leave, preferring to focus on the graphic style that would become his signature. Raoul Dufy (1877–1953) was a French painter and set designer. Trained at the École des Beaux-Arts in Le Havre, he began his career as a landscape painter in Normandy and then in Provence, where he associated with the ‘Fauves’ – Albert Marquet, Vlaminck and later Matisse. He produced numerous scenes of festooned streets and village festivals, rendered in vivid, colourful brushstrokes, such as this *Bal populaire*, which dates from this period. Influenced by the work of Cézanne, he subsequently turned his hand to still life, before meeting Braque and Picasso. All three worked together, exchanging their formal explorations, which would lead them to Cubism. But very quickly, Dufy developed his own style, separating colour from line: the lines are superimposed on areas of colour, as in what remains his masterpiece, *La Fée électricité*, held at the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris. A versatile and inquisitive artist, Dufy tried his hand at all forms of art, from tapestry designs to lithography and even ceramics, designing theatre sets and costumes for Jean Cocteau, and illustrating texts by Apollinaire, Gide and Colette.